Shut Out in Week Seven

It probably hasn’t escaped most NFL fans that something unusual is happening in week seven. Three different teams have been shut out.

The Cardinals were beaten, 33-0, by the Rams. In addition to treating London fans to a performance that could, on its own, cause serious harm to the NFL’s popularity overseas, Arizona lost quarterback Carson Palmer to an injury that may end his season.

The Colts fell to the Jaguars, 27-0. Jacksonville’s defense is one of the positive stories of this season – a unit that could drive a playoff run for a team that probably wouldn’t make the playoffs at all based on offense alone. The Jaguar defense has taken all the pressure off of a difficult quarterback situation.

The Broncos, suddenly looking quite bad, lost 21-0 to the Chargers, playing in front of a crowd that seemed made up mostly of family and friends of the players (I exaggerate).

Not only have three teams failed to score this week, but they lost to three teams that had a combined total of 12 wins in 2016.

Is this unusual? The three shutouts brings the 2017 total to five. That’s two more than we had in all of 2016. Since 1978, there have been 345 shutouts (8.6 per year). The most in a season was 17 in 1992. The least was two in 1994. We’re in a down-cycle lately, probably because scoring is up. Just 37 in the last eight years.

Do they come in bunches? Shutouts don’t happen all that often, so one could perceive a bunch just because they’re notable. The last time there were three in a week was week 15 of 2012. There were only two other shutouts the entire year. Three has happened a few times. The last time there were four shutouts in a week was week 12 in 1983. And the only other time there were more than three in the modern era (I go back to 1974 when the passing rules were changed) was the opening week of 1977 with five.

So I don’t think this is a sudden and notable occurrence. Odds are good we won’t have more than a handful of shutouts the rest of the season.

What about scoring in general? Is it down this season? So far this year, NFL teams have averaged 21.9 points per team per game. That’s the lowest since 2009 and down from last year’s near-record of 22.9 (a half point lower than 2013’s record total of 23.4). But 21.9 matches the most from 1968-2007, so it’s not an unusually low total. And prior to this week, teams were averaging 22.2 points, which is certainly in line with recent seasons.

My sense is that scoring is a bit down this year. If I had to put my finger on it, based on a cursory look at statistics, I’d say improved pass rushing is making teams decide to throw a tiny bit less – perhaps that’s also because we have some more inexperienced quarterbacks this season or the league is allowing a little more contact from defensive backs. It’s very hard to tell without a full season of data.